


Duality of a Man

by leezh



Category: Korean Drama, The King: Eternal Monarch, 더 킹：영원의 군주 | The King: Eternal Monarch (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Guess who is who, Inspired by K-Drama | Korean Drama, Parallel Universes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-19
Updated: 2020-05-19
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:55:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24268543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leezh/pseuds/leezh
Summary: Myeong Seung-ah visited Captain Jo Yeong after the Lunar New Year incident, and she caught on that there was something slightly off about him.Later on, the Captain continued to surprise her with even more new sides that she never knew he had.-Update: Non canon as of Episode 11.
Relationships: Jo Eun-seob/Myeong Seung-ah, Jo Yeong/Myeong Seung-ah
Comments: 20
Kudos: 115





	Duality of a Man

Seung-ah went over her list of questions on her mind one more time, feeling the cold sweats and berating herself for not preparing more thoroughly. She was embarrassed by her own giddiness one minute, and resisted the strongest urge to escape a minute later. _Darn it._

She absolutely knew how much she was screwed.

She had a big crush on Captain Jo, she never tried to hide that fact. Even after she had been working at the palace and crossed paths with the man a few times over the past few months, she would in full self-awareness describe her fixation as something akin to the idol-fan variety and nothing more. She was happy every time she bumped into or even just generally saw him around. The Unbreakable Sword. Steadfast, strong and highly skilled in combat as a soldier. Seung-ah just had a thing for a man in command and she thought of him as the coolest man alive and put him on a pedestal, like he was an invincible superhero, blatantly ignoring the fact that Jo Yeong was very much human and even had the riskiest job in the kingdom as Captain of the Royal Guards. 

Previously, the thought of him being injured never even entered her mind. But that was before the Lunar New Year incident gave her a harsh wake up call. 

And she just happened to be the one with the task of reassuring the people that the Captain was fine and the Royal Court had everything under control.

And so, Seung-ah found herself in front of his hospital room, after being given clearance by the Royal Guards, feeling unsure whether her unsettling feelings was caused by her fantasy being shattered in the process, or entirely something else.

Seung-ah knocked on the door, and then waited for his acknowledgement before coming in. “Jo Yeong _daejangnim_?”

"Come in."

Bracing herself for the encounter, her tablet gripped tightly by her clammy hands, Seung-ah stepped in.

He was clad in the hospital gown, sitting comfortably on his bed. She could see the bandage peeking out from his right collar and his IV tube snaking out from his left hand, but other than that, he looked okay, just like what Head Court Lady Noh had said.

She sighed in relief.

 _He looks very much okay_ , actually, to the point that Seung-ah was pretty sure she caught him gaping ever so slightly upon seeing her enter the room. She had also wondered whether her imagination played tricks on her when she thought she saw Jo Yeong blinked in uncertainty, it seems, for several times. 

“Ah, what brings you here?”

“I apologize to disturb your rest, Captain Jo. But the Royal Public Affairs Office would like to prepare a post to reassure the public regarding your condition. That’s why I’m here.”

“Ahh, I see.” Jo Yeong was uncharacteristically flustered, she was sure about it then, and she wondered if it was because he was uncomfortable with the prospect of re-triggering the attention he garnered through his latest (and first ever) SNS post.

“Ah, please, have a seat.”

Seung-ah moved the chair closer to his bed, then took her seat.

She prepared her tablet. When she looked up, Jo Yeong was openly staring at her. And while she was so used to seeing him standing there unmoving, gaze locked upfront, this time it felt different. He looked like he couldn't believe what he saw, which did not make any sense at all as he knew perfectly that she worked for the Royal Public Affairs Office.

Seung-ah felt her cheeks burning slightly. “Are you really okay, Jo _daejangnim_?”

“Of course!” His reply came a bit too enthusiastic than what she would ever expect from the reserved Captain. He cleared his throat, then continued in a much calmer voice, as if he was overcompensating. “Yes, yes I am. I have the bulletproof vest to thank for that. I’m really okay, just some torn muscles and ligaments, nothing serious. There’s totally no need to worry about me.”

 _Oh, thank God_ , she thought.

“And how long do they expect you to recover?” 

“Uh… Around two weeks?”

Seung-ah stopped her typing. “Around two weeks?” she repeated his words back to him, even echoing his hesitated tone at the end. “That’s…quite a while.”

“Yeah…” Jo Yeong agreed, looking visibly deflated. But then, as if he picked up on her disappointment, he added, “But actually, two weeks is not that long, don’t you think? It will go by quickly, especially if you’re busy.”

At that time, she heard the sound of the door being opened. Seung-ah turned in her seat to see Lee Gon, the King himself, entering the room.

“ _Pyeha!_ ” Seung-ah stood up in an instant.

The King looked apologetic. “Apologize for the sudden interruption, but can you wrap it up with Yeong? I need to talk to him about something.”

“Ah, yes, sure, _Pyeha_. I can make do.”

Seung-ah closed her tablet's cover to put it in sleep mode. She had several more questions left, actually, but they served her personal curiosity more than the materials she needed for the post. She could gather the rest of the information from the Medical Team in charge, anyway. “Thank you for your time, Captain Jo. Hope you have a speedy recovery.”

“You're very much welcome, and thank you too.” He smiled such a goofy smile then, and Seung-ah would lie if she didn’t say that she was stunned to see it.

The last thing she saw after she excused herself to the King and departed the room was the sight of Jo Yeong glancing at the King, his smile wiped off his face. The captain produced a nervous cough then.

She got the sense that he was due for some scolding session from the King, but she could not think of a reason why.

~

Much much later on that day, when she had finally returned to her own place, Seung-ah looked back at the events that happened that afternoon.

The Captain did not seem like himself, she mused. He was flustered, much more expressive, and gave off different vibes than he usually did. She could even say that he became slightly childlike, with the sudden openness and awkwardness that she could not seem to fathom was ever possessed by the man. Perhaps the medicine he was on caused him to lose his inhibitions, somewhat. 

Seung-ah cracked open her cold beer. As she took the first sip, she decided that while she still could not decipher the meaning of it all and wondered if she even liked those new sides of him, she was positive about one thing: the fanfiction writer side of her did find Jo Yeong to be more interesting.

~

Her next encounter with Jo Yeong happened much sooner that she expected. Didn’t he say that it probably would take him around two weeks to recover?

But there he was, merely ten days later (but she did not keep any count, of course), looking as if nothing had happened as she bumped into him when they both ended up on the same intersection of the palace.

“Jo _daejangnim,”_ she greeted him, to which he merely responded with a silent nod. _His trademark._

They walked side by side for a while. 

He looked as dapper as ever in his dark, three-piece suit and perfectly styled hair, and stealing glances on his side profile, Seung-ah noticed that he had his earpiece on. It was business as usual, then.

“Isn't it too soon for you to be back at work already?”

Jo Yeong did not reply, instead he raised one of his eyebrows as if to say, “What do you mean?”

“Your injury,” Seung-ah clarified. “Have you fully recovered?”

“Ah, yes.” For some reason, there was a flicker of _something_ across his face as he acknowledged it, but it passed too quickly and he was back to his neutral expression before she could even blink. He did not offer any more words.

Seung-ah opened her mouth to break the silence, but she stopped short after following his gaze which was curiously trained on a particular partition door on their right. He had his head tilted and eyebrows knitted, and it took her awhile to realize that the Captain just stopped in his tracks and made a motion with his hand, for her to stand back, and-

Next thing she knew, Jo Yeong yanked her away from the door and threw her probably a good few feet away from the impact as the sound of the wood breaking pierced the night.

Someone had just shot through the holes on the partition door, Seung-ah realized belatedly, and upon realizing that his hiding place was discovered, the intruder also slammed a chair on Jo Yeong, which moved swiftly to avoid the crash. She gasped to see the flash of a gun in the masked intruder’s hands.

It was like her brain stopped working.

She watched as the Captain’s suit flapped around him, in sync with his mechanical precision as he blocked the intruder’s blow upon blow and put in his own offenses. Their movement was too fast for her to completely follow, but she did catch a few things along the way. Like how he drove the assailant away from her, moving swiftly with much calculation as if leaving no chance for the gun to be used. At one point, Jo Yeong slammed his fist on the other man’s chest, sending him backwards, and with another move, kicked the weapon away from his hand.

The gun clattered to the floor, and wasting no time, the Captain strangled the assailant in a headlock as his opponent flailed around trying to escape from his clutch. Shortly after, Jo Yeong delivered his final blow, flipping the masked man down with a heavy thud, sending him incapacitated.

Seung-ah continued to stare as he moved to restrain the intruder’s hands on his back with some ropes that she did not even know he carried around, and also picked the gun up with his handkerchief.

Only after then, the Captain approached her and lowered himself to crouch down in front of her. “You okay?”

“I- I guess so,” Seung-ah breathed out, looking down towards the bullet holes - _not just one!_ \- on the floor, then sideways to her feet. One of her shoes was missing, and she should have grazed something earlier, as there was a single trail of blood coming from her torn pants, but she didn’t feel any pain. _Yet._

Seung-ah looked up to see Jo Yeong had noticed it too. “I apologize for throwing you,” he declared. His brows were slightly knitted and his lips slightly pursed. He clearly disapproved.

“Don’t mention it. You saved me.” And she was still slightly in a daze about that fact.

“Can you stand?” he asked, but did not wait for her answer. Instead, he lifted his left wrist to speak into his communication line. “I need someone on the East Wing. An intruder broke through. He's neutralized, but there might be others. Team 2 and 3, do a full sweep on the outer perimeter.”

In cue, two royal guards rushed in shortly after. Jo Yeong gave one of them the gun as the other checked up on the assailant. And then, without saying anything more, he scooped her up. “I’ll take you to the infirmary.”

The first thing on Seung-ah's thoughts was, how effortless it seemed for him to carry her bridal style. And then she became hyper aware of her arms' placements on the captain's neck and shoulders ( _and how sturdy they felt like under her skin_ ), how good he smelled ( _just a hint of sandalwood mixed with something else she could not really identify_ ), and how cute it was that his usual slicked back hair was ruffled during the fight, leaving a few loose strands falling over his forehead ( _which he didn’t seem to notice, at all_ ).

Last but totally not the least, of course she would notice how close their faces were to each other’s, and, well, let's just say that her brain had been short-circuited even more the moment he picked her up, really, so it was not a surprise that she could not seem to put a coherent speech to break the silence.

But it was not like he made any effort at starting a conversation either. The infirmary was not that close to the East Wing, but along the way, the Captain did not make a single remark. He had his gaze locked upfront the whole time, and judging by his hardened expression, Seung-ah would bet that his mind had already been dominated by the attack and nothing else.

She knew she was being petulant, but he did make her question her feminine charms. She didn't care about the fact that it was unintentional on his part as it was just who he was, she just could not help but feel irritated. Would it kill the man to show even a hint of being affected by their proximity?

"I'm heavy, am I not?" she blurted out, then mentally kicked herself for the embarassing comment. That totally did not come out as she intended. “I mean, your injured shoulder…" she finished lamely.

"Nothing I cannot handle," was all he said, and while it was most probably true as she did just witness him flipping over the assailant who was two times larger than him with ease, still, it was the least of things any lady would want to hear.

Seung-ah scoffed, coming into the conclusion that his different self at the hospital should be a fluke. The man was too rigid and unimaginative for his own good. “This is why you don’t have a girlfriend.”

Jo Yeong stopped in his tracks at that remark. She watched his eyes bulged ever slightly, and-

What happened next put Seung-ah in a complete awestruck mode as she almost could not believe it.

A laugh just escaped from him, _Jo Yeong daejangnim_ , the stoic royal guard, the reserved, unyielding, impossible man. And it wasn’t an exaggerated smile too, it was a full blown laugh that lasted for just several unbelievable seconds, yet reverberated from deep within his stomach.

All because of her.

“I have never seen you laugh before…” Seung-ah’s voice trailed off as she was still trying to come to terms with it, mesmerized.

_Boy, he’s irresistible._

Jo Yeong tilted his head slightly towards her, but he didn’t respond any further until they had reached the infirmary. He had reverted back to his neutral stoic expression.

After pushing the door open with his shoulder, he placed her down gently on one of the beds. 

Seung-ah would describe his voice as very soft as he said, finally breaking the silence, “You are a very interesting person, Miss Myeong Seung-ah.”

The fact that he was looking at her directly with something akin to quiet amusement and fascination totally had caught her off guard, and she thought it wasn't even more possible to do.

~

**Author's Note:**

> A tribute to Swoon Do-hwan.


End file.
